Web Design
WORDPRESS and CUSTOM WEB DESIGN FOR BUSINESSES & NONPROFITS
Let's Move You from Where You Are to Where You Ought to Be
Your website is the first impression your customers will have of your business online. It should be a direct reflection of your company able to earn their trust and convince them to take the next step.
I design and build sites that are clean, professional, compelling, fast-loading, and accessible to your visitors. I can help you build and maintain your brand, communicate effectively with your audience, strengthen your marketing channels, generate leads and drive sales.
What I Do
I work with small businesses, nonprofits, professional practices and organizations across the Philadelphia region and beyond to create, manage and expand their online presence.
Web Design Services
I provide custom web design as well as a variety of other options based on major platforms. I’m involved in everything from layout, typography, photography, content production, as well as all the technical and marketing aspects of each site I build.
WordPress Development
WordPress powers over 45% of the Web for good reason—it’s flexible, affordable, easy to maintain and manage.
Accessible Web Design
Your website should work for everyone. I design and build websites that meet WCAG 2.2 and Section 508 accessibility standards. I also provide accessibility audits and VPAT assessments for organizations that need compliance documentation.
eCommerce
Sell online with Shopify, BigCommerce or WooCommerce. I set up your store, input inventory, configure payments and shipping, and design a great buying experience for your customers.
Website Maintenance & Support
A website isn’t a “set it and forget it” project. A little effort goes a long way to avoid staleness and poor visitor experiences. I offer a wide-variety maintenance packages covering updates, backups, security monitoring and content updates and more.
How We Work Together
How a Web Design Project Works
Most projects have four main steps. Timelines are flexible, but a small-business site typically takes four to eight weeks from kickoff to launch.
Step 1— Discovery
It’s best to start with a conversation about your business, your current audience, and what you want to accomplish. I’ll review your current site (if you have one), look at your competitors, and provide a proposal.
Step 2— Planning, Structure & Design
At the start, we need to finalize the overall plan and structure for your new site. Designs are created and staged for review. We’ll likely go back and forth a bit until arriving at a successful design that fits your goals.
Step 3— Build & Review
The site is built on a staging server, where I can work and test (for example, how it appears on desktop, laptop, tablet and mobile).
Step 4— Launch & Support
Why Clients Choose Me
I’ve spent over twenty years designing, developing, and marketing websites—in agency roles, as a department head, and now as an independent consultant. That depth of experience means you work with one person who understands design, code, content strategy, SEO, and accessibility, not a chain of mystery personnel in an overseas office.
A Few Other Things That Set My Work Apart
Philadelphia-based, but not limited to it. Most of my clients are in the Philadelphia metro area—the Main Line, South Jersey, Bucks County, Delaware—but I work with organizations across the country.
Frequently Asked Web Design Questions
How much does a website cost?
The overall cost is completely determined by the size of the scope of work. Small websites of five pages or less might be under $1000, while a large site with special features could be several times that.
The main things that impact the scope are number of pages, whether custom functionality is needed (think membership portals, ecommence or donation, advanced forms, etc.) and any additional requirements for content creation, etc.
I’m transparent about costs before work begins, no surprise invoices and no hidden fees. Contact me or request a quote and I’ll provide you a detailed estimate based on your specific needs.
How long does a website project take?
Most small-business websites take four to eight weeks from kickoff to launch. A simpler site with five or so pages and content ready to could go live in under a month. Large scale project typically go beyond eight weeks.
The most common reasons a project would run longer than expected are waiting on content, photos, or client feedback and approvals.
That said, if your situation requires, a project can be moved forward more slowly allowing you to work on it when you can.
I’m flexible.
What do I need to have ready before we start?
For the first conversation, you just need to bring yourself and set up a good time to call.
For the project, you don’t need everything on day one. The discovery phase helps us both sort out exactly what you’ll need to provide and when.
Common items to gather up would be:
- Your logo and brand guidelines (colors, fonts, styles rules)
- Login credentials for your current website, hosting account and domain registrar.
- Photos of your business, staff, projects or products.
- A list of 3-5 sites you like for discussion.
- A sense of what the site should accomplish.
If you are missing some of these, don’t worry. We can work out what to do, or I can help fill in some of the gaps with content stategy, copywriting, and sourcing photos as part of the project.
Will I own my website, domain, and content?
I make every effort to ensure that is the case. A business should always keep a domain registration in their name. The site itself, design, content, images, etc. should be yours. There are no transfer fees or locks if you ever decide to move on.
This matter because I’ve helped more than a few clients escape situations where a previous designer or agency controlled their domain, held the site files hostage, even claimed ownership over the site and its content, or charged a huge “exit fee” to transfer or migrate the site away. I wouldn’t except any of that myself and so I don’t expect you to either.
Do you redesign existing sites?
I do! A good number of my clients’ projects are redesigns rather than starting over from scratch. In a redesign I’m usually looking to salvage as much as possible: preserving your existing content and messaging, URL structure and search rankings. That’s often the best path.
If you’re on an outdated or locked-down platform—Wix, Squarespace, an old custom-coded HTML site, or something no longer supported like Adobe Muse—I’ll migrate your content to a modern WordPress setup or similar. I’ve handled these migrations many times, including moving and rebuilding content, redirecting old URLs so you don’t lose search traffic, and replacing the functionality that was provided by the previous platform. Either way, the goal is always to provide a site that looks contemporary and is easy to maintain going forward.
What platforms do you build on, and why?
The “why” answer is always “the best platform for your current and long term needs and goals.” I’m not dogmatic about platforms. I understand their relative strengths and weaknesses and help guide you to the best options.
Many of my projects are built on WordPress, which powers over 45% of the web. I recommend it for most small businesses, nonprofits, and professional practices because it’s flexible, well-supported, and gives you full ownership of your site. You’re not locked into a proprietary system, and there are thousands of developers who can work on a WordPress site if your needs change down the road.
When it comes to ecommerce, Shopify, BigCommerce and WooCommerce are most common among my clients. Shopify is often the best option for a young, but still serious, ecommerce business.
For online course websites, you might consider Thinkific, Systeme, Kajobi or Teachable. There are also paid plugins for WordPress that provide suitable features.
Platforms like Framer, WebFlow or even Squarespace have their time and place and might match your needs.
Can you help with content — writing, photography, SEO?
Absolutely. I offer content strategy, copywriting, and search engine optimization either part of a website project, or as a standalone service.
Photos can often be sourced, but if you need a photographer, I can recommend one locally and coordinate shoots of your team, space, work or products.
SEO services should be part of every site build even if just to handle the basics. This would include focus on page titles, meta-descriptions, heading structure, image optimization, site speed, XML sitemaps, and set up for Google Analytics, Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools. Ongoing SEO work, such as keyword research, content planning, link building, digital PR, Google Business Profile management, and local search optimization are all available as a separate engagement.
In short, you may bring your own content and I will design and build around it, or I can handle the whole thing. Most times folks land somewhere in the middle.
Will I be able to update the site myself after it launches?
The short answer is Yes, but someone in your organization would need need to have the required skills or be trained. Most sites I built are on WordPress or another content management system which allow a person to add pages, update text, add images and publish blog articles with a fairly shallow learning curve. That is important work, so the person taking it one should have the time and background to do it well.
Many clients prefer hand off these talks to me and just provide content edits when they are required. Such work is typically handled on an hourly basis.
What's included in your WordPress maintenance packages?
- Updating WordPress core, its theme, and all plugin on an regular schedule.
- Regular automated backups stored offsite, so your site can be restored quickly if anything goes wrong.
- Security monitoring including malware scanning, firewall management, and SSL certificate renewal.
- Uptime monitoring, so I’m aware of outages before you are.
- Potentially content updates or other regular help you require.
Featured Projects
A few recent projects. Visit the full portfolio for more.
Monell Center - Annual Report
Services Provided:
- WordPress development
- Website maintenance
The Philadelphia Orthopaedic Society
Services Provided:
- Custom Web design
- WordPress development
- Dues and lecture payment processing
- Web hosting
- Website maintenance
Main Line Restaurant Week is a great twice-annual dining event in suburban Philadelphia. Participating restaurants offer special, prix-fixe menus showcasing their chefs’ greatest dishes.
Services Provided:
- Custom Web design
- WordPress development
- Information Architecture
- Email Marketing
- Website maintenance
- Strategic consulting
A wonderful lawyer putting out the proverbial shingle.
Services Provided:
- Custom Web design
- WordPress development
- Web hosting
- Website maintenance
A great dental practice combining the specialties of pediatric dentistry and orthodontics in downtown Portland, Oregon.
Services Provided:
- WordPress site development
- Information architecture
- Website maintenance
- SEO consulting
Paint Pittston Pink™, a 501c3 organization, was established in 2014 with a mission to “bring the community together to support a cure for ALL cancers through research and clinical trials.” It has recently rebranded to Paint the Planet Pink™ to better reflect its expanded vision. To date they have raised over $1,000,000!
Services Provided:
- Custom Web design
- Web development
- Email marketing
- Ecommerce
- Website maintenance
- Web Hosting
Portfolio
Let's Talk About Your Project
Whether you have a detailed plan or just a rough idea, I’d like to hear about it. I’ll follow up within 24 hours.
Local Communities Served
Providing web design services to businesses in Philadelphia and the surrounding area for over 20 years.
Suburbs
Regional
Allentown, PA
Cherry Hill, NJ
Doylestown, PA
Haddonfield, NJ
New Hope, PA
Princeton, NJ
Reading, PA
Wilmington, DE
